The disciples have locked themselves in an upper room for fear of the Jews. We know exactly where they’re at. We too are good at making prisons for ourselves. We make prisons where feelings of inadequacy, apathy, guilt, pride or confusion rule our lives. We lock ourselves into debilitating patterns of behaviour where fear and other self-defeating traits become habit. The disciples are behaving very
In these final chapters of John’s Gospel, Jesus is trying to sum up what his life and mission is all about. He speaks at length of the bond between him and his Father and it is from this bond of love that he is ‘sent’. Jesus tells us that we too are ‘sent’ to continue his mission. Friendship with Jesus is being with him, and
There are times in our lives when we feel a sense of abandonment. We might be left with feelings of panic, despair and emptiness at the break up of a relationship, the loss of a loved one; or when the future we thought so secure is turned on its head through job loss, financial ruin or illness. The disciples must be feeling a little like
Does it ever seem to you that Jesus can be a little unrealistic? Today Jesus tells us “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. But how can we go round loving everyone we meet? Isn’t love reserved to those closest to us … our parents, children, and partners? Harder
Jesus is the ‘Good Shepherd’ and we are his flock …. or are we? It’s easy to call ourselves Catholics or Christians, but unless we act like it we are only Catholics in name. How can we call Jesus our shepherd or our role model yet not model our behaviour after the most basic of church teachings? How can we be a part of Jesus’
After the Resurrection, we might have expected the disciples to rush off in a frenzy of enthusiasm spreading the good news, but no, today we find them back on the lake fishing. When you stop for a minute to imagine what it might have been like to be in Peter’s shoes perhaps it isn’t all that surprising. Peter had given up everything for Jesus and
